Many animals, particularly hogs, have a strip of valuable meat extending along their spinal column where the featherbones extend outwardly therefrom. Substantial manual labor has been required in the past in order to recover that strip of meat. Portions thereof have previously been recovered by placing the split spinal column, with its back rib removed, upon a flat horizontal table having a band saw running vertically therethrough. The spinal column, with the flat side of the featherbones down, is then guided manually across the flat table along a line such that the saw will sever the featherbones along the spinal column. In doing so, however, a very substantial portion of the strip of meat lying alongside the spinal column is missed and is not recovered because it thereafter moves with the spinal column, for processing into fertilizer and the like.
Not all spinal columns have featherbones. Under the prior art practices, such spinal columns were not sawed, because of danger to the employee's hands. As a consequence, the entire strip of meat extending along the spinal column was lost, since it remained attached to the spinal column, which is converted into fertilizer.
The above procedures are not only dangerous, they are costly because of the substantial loss of meat. In addition two (2) men are required, one to present the racks of bones to the platform and the other to feed the rack of bones past the saw, and to move the severed pieces beyond and away from the saw. Thus, there is a need for a better method of recovering the meat so as to increase the yield and to reduce the man-power requirements. I have provided an improved method of recovering such meat, and a simple but effective machine for practicing same.